i'm a trust fund kid without the benefit of billions at my fingertips
and i'm sick of it. sick of myself. so i will evolve. and they say that nothing changes too slowly, but tonight, nothing can change fast enough.
im ready to take my first step, away from my old self, to leave my own ghost where it belongs, in the past.
and in the midst of the chaos, the dark cloud over my head, i manage to find a bit of respite,
and milk it for every second
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Monday, April 20, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
We will be held to account for every word we speak
I have been reading Matthew and a few Psalms this week, and the main thing that keeps standing out to me is how much emphasis there is on being honest, and being careful with the words that we speak.
Good fruit comes from good trees, evil springs forth from evil:
Matthew 12:36
I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every areless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.
Jesus says that we shouldn't swear by God, or by anything else for that matter, and rather than taking an oath, let your yes become an oath to those who know you, and your no become the same.
Matthew 5:37
Let what you say be simply "Yes" or "No"; anything more than this comes from evil.
Psalm 101:5
Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly, I will destroy. Whoever has a haughty look and an arrogant heart, I will not endure.
Psalm 101:7
No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my housel no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes.
Psalm 31:18
Let the lying lips be mute, which speak insolently against the righteous in pride and contempt
After reading all of those verses, it gave me a broader understanding of the golden rule, also found in Matthew, as it becomes clear that treating others as we want to be treated definitely includes the words we speak. I know there are countless other passages in the Bible that talk about guarding our mouths, being honest, etc. etc., it just really stood out to me what an emphasis was put on it by Jesus in Matthew, and by David in the Psalms.
Matthew 7:12
So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
So my takeaway from this is it's time for me to guard the gate by which folly and lies would so happily spill out from, and be sure that I am honest, I am kind, and I do not gossip. After all, what is the tongue if not a rudder for our ship, or a spark to a great forest.
On a lighter note, I've found a great way to start my morning is to wake up an extra fifteen minutes or so early and read a couple of psalms.
Everyone who reads this needs to go now and sign up for the forum I started: guf.11.forumer.com
go to the "life in general" subject and click on "what this forums all about" and read my little statement. Thankyou all, have a great day
Good fruit comes from good trees, evil springs forth from evil:
Matthew 12:36
I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every areless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.
Jesus says that we shouldn't swear by God, or by anything else for that matter, and rather than taking an oath, let your yes become an oath to those who know you, and your no become the same.
Matthew 5:37
Let what you say be simply "Yes" or "No"; anything more than this comes from evil.
Psalm 101:5
Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly, I will destroy. Whoever has a haughty look and an arrogant heart, I will not endure.
Psalm 101:7
No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my housel no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes.
Psalm 31:18
Let the lying lips be mute, which speak insolently against the righteous in pride and contempt
After reading all of those verses, it gave me a broader understanding of the golden rule, also found in Matthew, as it becomes clear that treating others as we want to be treated definitely includes the words we speak. I know there are countless other passages in the Bible that talk about guarding our mouths, being honest, etc. etc., it just really stood out to me what an emphasis was put on it by Jesus in Matthew, and by David in the Psalms.
Matthew 7:12
So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
So my takeaway from this is it's time for me to guard the gate by which folly and lies would so happily spill out from, and be sure that I am honest, I am kind, and I do not gossip. After all, what is the tongue if not a rudder for our ship, or a spark to a great forest.
On a lighter note, I've found a great way to start my morning is to wake up an extra fifteen minutes or so early and read a couple of psalms.
Everyone who reads this needs to go now and sign up for the forum I started: guf.11.forumer.com
go to the "life in general" subject and click on "what this forums all about" and read my little statement. Thankyou all, have a great day
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Everything we do is worship
I discovered Calvary SLO podcasts on itunes today, listened to a sermon called "Worship: The God who transforms" while I folded my laundry. I'm excited to go to church on Sunday now, I like what the pastor has to say about alot of stuff. I have been thinking about the idea of worship ever since, and this is what came out, some of it is taken directly from the sermon, some of it is paraphrased, and some of it is just my thoughts on it. I really like Romans 12:1-2, which talks about offering yourself as a living sacrifice to God, and that if we do this then we will be transformed to the image of God, and we will begin to know and understand his will, which is a very cool concept, and a conclusion that I came to while talking to Sean about how we can grow deeper in the Kingdom. Anyways just felt like I had to share whats on my mind today, I'm working on a really big post about everything thats been going on in my mind in the past week, but it might take a little while, I have alot on my plate right now.
the thing that you turn to when you're sad, the thing that you turn to to celebrate, thats the thing that you worship
when you get your paycheck, the first thing you go spend money on, the thing that you spend the most and best time focused on getting/pursuing
thats worship
just as everything in the universe is spiritual, from the largest object to the tiniest, from the least dimensional to the most mind blowingly multidimensional
every action, everything we do in this life, is worship, down to what our thought life revolves around, to what we spend our money on, to what we rely on to make us feel better when we're sad, or help us celebrate when things are good
and the more you start looking at the world this way, the more you start to see that so many of our problems are a problem of worship, of priorities, and of what we really value.
Because that which we REALLY value, those things we consider glorious
and those things we devote our lives to,
and it becomes very easy to devote our attention and our time and our entire lives to a false idol without ever realizing it
and in the end, all false idols fall.
Romans 12:1-2
Psalms 115
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Each life
Every life is a masterpiece in 4 dimensions, a colorful, animated sculpture with a soul.
This week God has been working in my life in completely unexpected ways. Since Sunday (see my latest post) I have started reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking. I picked it up off the shelf in my mom's library on Monday night and packed it to read on the train up to San Francisco. The train ride lasted two hours, and in that two hours I only read 24 pages. The reason I spent so much time in those first pages is that every time I read about a new concept, a new way to look at the world, whether I had heard it before or not, I was completely floored.
As I have been contemplating nature lately, I have been completely awed at the Creator behind the work of art that is our world, and reading about the vast universe just outside our front door, I was even more taken aback. Particularly, the concept of space time and time as a dynamic dimension, rather than the static entity we usually imagine it as completely blew my mind.
Hawking continues on and talks about general relativity and how it predicts it's own shortcomings as it predicts the big bang event. This is called a singularity, the point at which a theory cannot predict what came before, or what comes after it. What we do know about the big bang is that before it happened all the matter and energy in the universe was concentrated in an infinitely small and infinitely dense point of matter and energy. And then God spoke.
Think about that. God spoke the entire universe into existence. His voice, His breath, His love all have such great power, and such unbelievable beauty. We are experiencing only the smallest slice of this great work of art that is the universe, and we still consider it a masterpiece. Imagine looking down on it then, from God's perspective, this infinitely small point of matter and energy exploding, or perhaps more appropriately blooming into the hundreds of thousands of millions of galaxies full of hundreds of thousands of millions of stars, each with it's own solar system, each full of it's own natural wonders. And thats just the universe in 4 dimensions.
Now think about every life intertwined in four dimensions, meeting here, diverting there, forming a beautiful tapestry. But such a metaphor quickly fails as each life deserves so much more representation than just a line, or a string, even in three dimensions. Add to that the fact that there are several more dimensions, which have no realistic visual representation in our own three dimensional perspective, and the word tapestry seems to be a cheap substitute for something more beautiful than we can possibly imagine, perhaps more than we could ever perceive, let alone appreciate.
This week God has been working in my life in completely unexpected ways. Since Sunday (see my latest post) I have started reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking. I picked it up off the shelf in my mom's library on Monday night and packed it to read on the train up to San Francisco. The train ride lasted two hours, and in that two hours I only read 24 pages. The reason I spent so much time in those first pages is that every time I read about a new concept, a new way to look at the world, whether I had heard it before or not, I was completely floored.
As I have been contemplating nature lately, I have been completely awed at the Creator behind the work of art that is our world, and reading about the vast universe just outside our front door, I was even more taken aback. Particularly, the concept of space time and time as a dynamic dimension, rather than the static entity we usually imagine it as completely blew my mind.
Hawking continues on and talks about general relativity and how it predicts it's own shortcomings as it predicts the big bang event. This is called a singularity, the point at which a theory cannot predict what came before, or what comes after it. What we do know about the big bang is that before it happened all the matter and energy in the universe was concentrated in an infinitely small and infinitely dense point of matter and energy. And then God spoke.
Think about that. God spoke the entire universe into existence. His voice, His breath, His love all have such great power, and such unbelievable beauty. We are experiencing only the smallest slice of this great work of art that is the universe, and we still consider it a masterpiece. Imagine looking down on it then, from God's perspective, this infinitely small point of matter and energy exploding, or perhaps more appropriately blooming into the hundreds of thousands of millions of galaxies full of hundreds of thousands of millions of stars, each with it's own solar system, each full of it's own natural wonders. And thats just the universe in 4 dimensions.
Now think about every life intertwined in four dimensions, meeting here, diverting there, forming a beautiful tapestry. But such a metaphor quickly fails as each life deserves so much more representation than just a line, or a string, even in three dimensions. Add to that the fact that there are several more dimensions, which have no realistic visual representation in our own three dimensional perspective, and the word tapestry seems to be a cheap substitute for something more beautiful than we can possibly imagine, perhaps more than we could ever perceive, let alone appreciate.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Heaven, hell, history, and other light subjects
Last night Enzo was kind enough to give me a ride to iF, where Isaac talked about the incarnation. If you read my post from January (the 13th), you know that I have felt that the God of the Bible is contradictory to what I believe, and that logically I couldn't make it all add up.
I am the type of guy that has to make everything make sense. If I can't make some logical sense out of something, I reject it. It was under this pretense that I abandoned my walk with God. Last night at church, Isaac said something that was peripheral to his core message: there are things that go beyond human logic, but don't contradict it.
I need to preface this next part by saying that I have been absolutely overjoyed with life for several weeks now. Every day I wake up, happy to be alive, and the smile I wear as I step into the shower usually lasts all day long. Thats why I was so surprised and confused when I was brought to tears by Isaac's message last night. I don't know what it means, I know I was moved, and I know some of the things that he said resonated with me but that doesn't explain my reaction.
While I don't fully understand where I am spiritually, or what it was about last night that so deeply moved me, I know that it's time that I confront some of the things that I wasn't ready to a couple of years ago.
After the service, I asked Isaac if he would grab a cup of coffee with me so I could pick his brain on a couple of things. Met up with him today at 1st st. coffee and dove right into the biggest issue I think I've ever wrestled with: hell.
Hell
What is hell? In the evangelical church, hell is generally accepted to be a lake of fire, or some other state of suffering, that lasts forever. More liberal Christians hold that hell simply means the end of existence, that when someone dies and "goes to hell", it just means they cease to be.
As I wrote in my previous post, I have a hard time rationalizing how a loving God would throw literally trillions of people into a lake of fire forever simply because they didn't believe in him, especially considering the fact that many of them had slim to no chance of ever receiving the truth and finding salvation. But it's also impossible to ignore the passages in scripture that clearly describe hell as an actual place of suffering, a form of punishment.
So maybe it's something in between the two extremes. After all, it seems that while some of the scriptures about hell clearly describe it as unending suffering, there are others that describe it as temporary, referring to it as "the second death." So maybe hell is a punishment for the wicked deeds performed on earth, a punishment that fits the crime. So, for example, a rapist or a murderer would be punished more severely than someone who simply rejected God because they didn't have a good relationship with their dad, or because they were angry, blaming God for their own suffering in this life.
I had thought at one point that hell just meant ceasing to exist, after all John 3:16 says "for whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life." Maybe going to hell really does just mean the story ends at death, and the punishment is the fact that we miss out on heaven. But I am now starting to think that perhaps hell is a form of punishment, a place of suffering, which precedes that end of existence, but doesn't necesarily go on forever.
Also, Isaac talked about how he thinks that maybe God planned the entire course of human history so that anyone who WOULD accept God would be given a chance to. He referenced a passage from Acts to back that up, where Paul talks about how God disperesed different nations around the world in order that his will would be done according to a specific plan and timeline. That really clicked with me, since thats how I believe God created the universe to begin with, by orchestrating an unbelievably chain of events that would lead to the evolution of life on this planet.
This concept of a symphony of human history, orchestrated by a loving God, plays right into the next issue we discussed at coffee. I have always struggled with the apparent change of God's nature from the old testament to the new testament.
Immutability
In ancient times, most people groups were polytheistic, in fact the Israelites were one of the only nations to worship one God as opposed to many. Another characteristic of spirituality in ancient times is that guilt and fear were the predominant aspects of religion. Not only did people worship many gods, but more importantly they were deathly afraid of them.
Perhaps it was for this reason then, that God chose to reveal his wrathful nature to the people of Israel, they simply weren't ready for the gospel as we know it. They were so conditioned by their time in slavery and the cultures around them that the only side of God's nature they were ready to see were his wrath and jealousy. This would make sense as far as the sacrifices required of the Israelites as well, the only way they knew how to relate to God was through guilt, and as such, the most spiritual and meaningful way they could relate to God was through a sacrifice that symbolized the cleansing of their guilt and fear.
After all, many old testament passages point towards the coming of Christ, and as time goes on it becomes clear that it's not about the sacrifice, it's about Love, Mercy and Forgiveness. Even when Christ became flesh on earth, even when God tabernacled himself among us, we weren't ready for his message.
So it isn't that God's nature changed, but rather that God was leading the Israelites towards a better understanding of who He is, and what He wants for them and from them. It gives a whole new meaning to wandering in the desert.
While I won't presume to know whether or not any of these ideas are right, or even close to being right, I am now at a point where I understand that these are things that surpass human logic, not contradict it. That one statement that Isaac made on Sunday night made me rethink everything more than I have in more than two years.
If anyone ever wants to talk about stuff like this, just let me know. For now I will be thinking and reading and prayerfully considering these issues as well as many others and would appreciate your prayers as well.
Thanks for reading, and thanks for your support and friendship over the past several years. The symphony has just gotten started.
I am the type of guy that has to make everything make sense. If I can't make some logical sense out of something, I reject it. It was under this pretense that I abandoned my walk with God. Last night at church, Isaac said something that was peripheral to his core message: there are things that go beyond human logic, but don't contradict it.
I need to preface this next part by saying that I have been absolutely overjoyed with life for several weeks now. Every day I wake up, happy to be alive, and the smile I wear as I step into the shower usually lasts all day long. Thats why I was so surprised and confused when I was brought to tears by Isaac's message last night. I don't know what it means, I know I was moved, and I know some of the things that he said resonated with me but that doesn't explain my reaction.
While I don't fully understand where I am spiritually, or what it was about last night that so deeply moved me, I know that it's time that I confront some of the things that I wasn't ready to a couple of years ago.
After the service, I asked Isaac if he would grab a cup of coffee with me so I could pick his brain on a couple of things. Met up with him today at 1st st. coffee and dove right into the biggest issue I think I've ever wrestled with: hell.
Hell
What is hell? In the evangelical church, hell is generally accepted to be a lake of fire, or some other state of suffering, that lasts forever. More liberal Christians hold that hell simply means the end of existence, that when someone dies and "goes to hell", it just means they cease to be.
As I wrote in my previous post, I have a hard time rationalizing how a loving God would throw literally trillions of people into a lake of fire forever simply because they didn't believe in him, especially considering the fact that many of them had slim to no chance of ever receiving the truth and finding salvation. But it's also impossible to ignore the passages in scripture that clearly describe hell as an actual place of suffering, a form of punishment.
So maybe it's something in between the two extremes. After all, it seems that while some of the scriptures about hell clearly describe it as unending suffering, there are others that describe it as temporary, referring to it as "the second death." So maybe hell is a punishment for the wicked deeds performed on earth, a punishment that fits the crime. So, for example, a rapist or a murderer would be punished more severely than someone who simply rejected God because they didn't have a good relationship with their dad, or because they were angry, blaming God for their own suffering in this life.
I had thought at one point that hell just meant ceasing to exist, after all John 3:16 says "for whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life." Maybe going to hell really does just mean the story ends at death, and the punishment is the fact that we miss out on heaven. But I am now starting to think that perhaps hell is a form of punishment, a place of suffering, which precedes that end of existence, but doesn't necesarily go on forever.
Also, Isaac talked about how he thinks that maybe God planned the entire course of human history so that anyone who WOULD accept God would be given a chance to. He referenced a passage from Acts to back that up, where Paul talks about how God disperesed different nations around the world in order that his will would be done according to a specific plan and timeline. That really clicked with me, since thats how I believe God created the universe to begin with, by orchestrating an unbelievably chain of events that would lead to the evolution of life on this planet.
This concept of a symphony of human history, orchestrated by a loving God, plays right into the next issue we discussed at coffee. I have always struggled with the apparent change of God's nature from the old testament to the new testament.
Immutability
In ancient times, most people groups were polytheistic, in fact the Israelites were one of the only nations to worship one God as opposed to many. Another characteristic of spirituality in ancient times is that guilt and fear were the predominant aspects of religion. Not only did people worship many gods, but more importantly they were deathly afraid of them.
Perhaps it was for this reason then, that God chose to reveal his wrathful nature to the people of Israel, they simply weren't ready for the gospel as we know it. They were so conditioned by their time in slavery and the cultures around them that the only side of God's nature they were ready to see were his wrath and jealousy. This would make sense as far as the sacrifices required of the Israelites as well, the only way they knew how to relate to God was through guilt, and as such, the most spiritual and meaningful way they could relate to God was through a sacrifice that symbolized the cleansing of their guilt and fear.
After all, many old testament passages point towards the coming of Christ, and as time goes on it becomes clear that it's not about the sacrifice, it's about Love, Mercy and Forgiveness. Even when Christ became flesh on earth, even when God tabernacled himself among us, we weren't ready for his message.
So it isn't that God's nature changed, but rather that God was leading the Israelites towards a better understanding of who He is, and what He wants for them and from them. It gives a whole new meaning to wandering in the desert.
While I won't presume to know whether or not any of these ideas are right, or even close to being right, I am now at a point where I understand that these are things that surpass human logic, not contradict it. That one statement that Isaac made on Sunday night made me rethink everything more than I have in more than two years.
If anyone ever wants to talk about stuff like this, just let me know. For now I will be thinking and reading and prayerfully considering these issues as well as many others and would appreciate your prayers as well.
Thanks for reading, and thanks for your support and friendship over the past several years. The symphony has just gotten started.
Latest lyrical ramblings
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Today the sunrise cast a warm light on the cold snow
All around I see signs of life for the first time
I'd begun to think this winter'd never end
but all along the soul of spring lay just beneath the ice,
the earth kept breathing through the freezing cold
fields of flowers waited for a reason to bloom
a welcome splash of color in a world long painted white
and as the seasons change, I see it all in a new light
as I'm reminded: life and love will carry on
my mouth betrays my heart, and I can't help but smile
as I walk on beneath the nearest star, our friendly sun
that gives life to this green sphere we call our home
I notice the brightest blues, and crispest greens
and the smoothest transition between the two,
this scenery is a gallery, stunning in its scope
it seems to me that nature is the purest form of art
the beauty all around is worth the wait through winter
for days like today, when walking feels just like flying
and as the seasons change, I see it all in a new light
as I'm reminded: life and love will carry on
my mouth betrays my heart, and I can't help but smile once again
------------------------------------------------------
Today the sunrise cast a warm light on the cold snow
All around I see signs of life for the first time
I'd begun to think this winter'd never end
but all along the soul of spring lay just beneath the ice,
the earth kept breathing through the freezing cold
fields of flowers waited for a reason to bloom
a welcome splash of color in a world long painted white
and as the seasons change, I see it all in a new light
as I'm reminded: life and love will carry on
my mouth betrays my heart, and I can't help but smile
as I walk on beneath the nearest star, our friendly sun
that gives life to this green sphere we call our home
I notice the brightest blues, and crispest greens
and the smoothest transition between the two,
this scenery is a gallery, stunning in its scope
it seems to me that nature is the purest form of art
the beauty all around is worth the wait through winter
for days like today, when walking feels just like flying
and as the seasons change, I see it all in a new light
as I'm reminded: life and love will carry on
my mouth betrays my heart, and I can't help but smile once again
------------------------------------------------------
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
